Philippians 4:2

I beseech R.V., I exhort. But the tenderer English word well represents the general tone here, and the Greek fully admits it as a rendering. See e.g. 2 Corinthians 12:8. Observe the repetition of the word.

Euodias … Syntyche Read certainly Euodia, a feminine name. In the versions of Tyndale and Cranmer the second name appears as "Sintiches," intended (like Euodias) to be a masculine name. But such a name is nowhere found in Greek inscriptions, nor is Euodias, though this might be contracted from the known name Euodianus. Both Euodia and Syntychê are known femininenames, and the persons here are evidently referred to as women, Philippians 4:3. Of these two Christians we know nothing but from this mention. They may have been "deaconesses," like Phœbe (Romans 16:1); they were certainly (see Philippians 4:3) active helpers of the Missionary in his days of labour at Philippi. Perhaps their activity, and the reputation it won, had occasioned a temptation to self-esteem and mutual jealousy; a phenomenon unhappily not rare in the modern Church. Bp Lightfoot (on this verse, and p. 55 of his edition) remarks on the prominence of women in the narrative of the evangelisation of Macedonia; Acts 16:13-15; Acts 16:40; Acts 17:4; Acts 17:12. He gives proof that the social position and influence of Macedonian women was higher than in most ancient communities. See above, Introduction, p. 13. The mention here of two women as important persons in the Philippian Church is certainly an interesting coincidence with the Acts. As a curiosity of interpretation, Ellicott (see also Lightfoot, p. 170) mentions the conjecture of Schwegler that Euodia and Syntyche are really designations of Church-parties, the names being devised and significant. This theory, of course, regards our Epistle as a fabrication of a later generation, intended as an eirenicon. "What will not men affirm?"

of the same mind in the Lord They must lay aside pique and prejudice, in the power and peace of their common union with Christ.